Those afflicted with the HIV virus are living longer with the disease today, thanks to successful drug cocktails that those in developed countries can afford. The HIV situation in undeveloped countries, however, remains catastrophic. That’s an outcome that Amy Jacobs would desperately like to change.
Jacobs, an assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, feels it’s the responsibility of academic medical research to pursue medical solutions that a pharmaceutical company won’t because they’re just not profitable. “As far as anything that is cheap and available in abundance for underprivileged populations, it’s not there,” she says.
Jacobs considers herself a protein chemist, concentrating on very basic science. She studies the proteins on the surface of the HIV virus and how they get the virus into the cell—the initial step in HIV infection. The goal is to not only develop inhibitors to HIV entry, but also to translate it into something that’s easy and economic to deliver. She has been the recipient of the Harold Brody/Emeritus Faculty Society Award for Clinical and Translational Research for her efforts to date.
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Complete article at UB Reporter : http://bit.ly/gDnq1D
